ТОП просматриваемых книг сайта:
The White Rose of Langley. Emily Sarah Holt
Читать онлайн.Название The White Rose of Langley
Год выпуска 0
isbn 4064066147082
Автор произведения Emily Sarah Holt
Жанр Языкознание
Издательство Bookwire
This tremendous supply was served in the following manner:
“The first course:—Venison with furmety; a potage called viaundbruse (broth made with pork and onions); heads of boars; great flesh (probably roast joints); swans roasted, pigs roasted; crustade lumbard (custard) in paste; and a subtlety.” (The subtlety was an ornamental dish, representing a castle, ship, human figures, etcetera.)
“The second course:—A potage called jelly (jellies of meat or fish were served as entrées); a potage of blandesore (a white soup); pigs roasted; cranes roasted; pheasants roasted; herons roasted; chickens roasted; breme (possibly pork broth); tarts; brokebrawn; conies roasted; and a subtlety.
“The third course:—Potage brewet of almonds (another white soup, made with almonds and rabbit or chicken broth); sewde lumbarde (probably some kind of stew); venison roasted; chickens roasted; rabbits roasted; partridges roasted; peions roasted; quails roasted; larks roasted; payne puff (a pudding); a dish of jelly; long fruits (a sweetmeat); and a subtlety.”
It must not be inferred that no vegetables were used, but simply that they were not thought worth mention. Our forefathers ate, either in vegetable or salad, almost every green thing that grew.
Before Maude had been many days in her new position, she made various discoveries—not all pleasant ones, and some at complete variance with her own preconceived fancies. In the first place she discovered that her Fairy Queen, Constance, was neither more nor less than a spoiled child. While the young Princess’s affections were very warm, she had been little accustomed to defer to any wishes but her own or those of her two brothers. The pair of boys governed their sister, but they swayed different sceptres. Edward ruled by fear, Richard by love. “Ned” must be attended to, because his wont was to make himself very disagreeable if he were not; but “Dickon” must have every thing he wanted, because Constance could not bear to deny her darling any thing. Bertram told Maude, however, that nobody could be more fascinating than Edward when he liked: the unfortunate item being that the happy circumstance very rarely occurred.
But Bertram’s information was not exhausted.
“Hast heard that the Lady of Buckingham cometh hither?”
“When?” Maude whispered back.
“To-morrow, to sup and bide the night. So thou mayest search her following for thy Mistress Hawise.”
“But shall all her following follow her?” inquired Maude.
“Every one, for she goeth anon unto her place in London to tarry the winter, and shall be here on her way thither. And hark thou, Maude! in her train—as thou shalt see—is the fairest lady in all the world.”
“And what name hath she?” was Maude’s answer.
“The fair Lady de Narbonne, widow of Sir Robert de Narbonne, a good knight and true, that fell in these late wars. She hath but some twenty years e’en now, and ’tis full three summers sithence his death.”
“And what like is she?”
“Like the angels in Paradise!” said Bertram enthusiastically. “I tell thee, there is none like her in all the world.”
Maude awaited the following evening with two-fold interest. She might possibly see Hawise, and she should certainly see some one who was like the angels in Paradise. The evening came, and with it the guests. One look at the Countess of Buckingham was enough. She certainly did not resemble the angels, unless they looked very cross and discontented. Her good qualities were not apparent to Maude, for they consisted of two coronets and an enormous fortune. Her ladies were much more interesting to Maude than herself. The first who entered behind her was a stiff middle-aged woman with dark hair.
“That is Dame Edusa,” (A fictitious person) whispered Bertram, “the Lady Mistress. Here is Mistress Polegna—yonder little damsel with the dark locks; and the high upright dame is Mistress Sarah. She that cometh after is the Lady de Say.”
Not one of these was the golden-haired Cousin Hawise, whose years barely numbered twenty. Maude’s eyes had come back in disappointment, when Bertram touched her arm.
“Now, Maude—look now! Look, the beauteous Lady de Narbonne! (A fictitious person.) Sawest ever maiden meet to be her peer?”
Maude looked, and saw a young girlish figure, splendidly attired—a rich red and white complexion, beautiful blue eyes, and a sunny halo of shining fair hair. But she saw as well, a cold, hard curve of the delicate lips, a proud cynical expression in the handsome eyes, a bold, forward manner. Yes, Maude admitted, the Lady de Narbonne was beautiful; yet she did not care to look at her. Bertram was disappointed. And so was Maude, for all hope of finding Hawise had disappeared.
When supper was over, the tables were lifted. The festive board was at this time literally a board or boards, which were simply set upon trestles to form a table. At the close of a meal, the tables were reduced to their primitive elements, and boards and trestles were either carried away, or heaped in one corner of the hall. The dining-room was thus virtually transmuted into the drawing-room, ceremony and precedence being discarded for the rest of the evening—state occasions of course excepted, and the royal persons present not being addressed unless they chose to commence a conversation.
Maude kept pretty strictly to her corner all that evening. She was generally shy of strangers, and none of these were sufficiently attractive to make her break through her usual habits. Least attractive of all, to her, was the lovely Lady de Narbonne. Her light, airy ways, which seemed to enchant the Earl’s knights and squires, simply disgusted Maude. She was the perpetual centre of a group of frivolous idlers, who dangled round her in the hope of leading her to a seat, or picking up a dropped glove. She laughed and chatted freely with them all, distributing her smiles and frowns with entire impartiality—except in one instance. One member of the Earl’s household never came within her circle, and he was the only one whom she seemed at all desirous to attract. This was Hugh Calverley. He held aloof from the bright lamp around which all the other moths were fluttering, and Maude fancied that he admired the queen of the evening as little as she did herself.
All at once, by no means to Maude’s gratification, the lady chose to rise and walk across the room to her corner.
“And what name hast thou, little maid?” she asked, with a light swing of her golden pomander—the vinaigrette of the Middle Ages.
Maude had become very tired of being asked her name, the more so since it was the manner in which strangers usually opened negotiations with her. She found it the less agreeable because she was conscious of no right to any surname, her mother’s being the only one she knew. So she answered “Maude” rather shortly.
“Maude—only Maude?”
“Only Maude. Madam, might it like your Ladyship to tell me if you wit of one Hawise Gerard anything?”
If the Lady de Narbonne would talk to her, Maude resolved to utilise the occasion; though she felt there could be little indeed in common between her gentle, modest cousin, and this far from retiring young widow. That they could not have been intimate friends Maude was sure; but acquaintances they might be—and must be, unless the Lady de Narbonne had been too short a time at Pleshy to know Hawise. As Maude in speaking lifted her eyes to the lady’s face, she saw the smiling lips grow suddenly grave, and the cold bright light die out of the beaming eyes.
“Child,” said the Lady de Narbonne seriously, “Hawise Gerard is dead.”
“Woe is me! I feared so much,” answered Maude sorrowfully. “And might it please you, Madam, to arede (tell) me fully when she died, and how, and where?”
“She died to thee, little maid, when she went to the Castle of Pleshy,” was the unsatisfactory answer.
“May I wit no more, Madam? Your Ladyship knew her, trow?”
“Once,” said the lady,